Six Women Scholars Who Are Taking on New Roles or Duties at Major Universities

Zoe Higheagle Strong, an associate professor of educational psychology and director of the Center for Native American Research and Collaborations at Washington State University, was promoted to vice provost for Native American relations and programs and tribal liaison to the president of the Washington State University System. For the past three years, she has been serving as executive director for tribal relations primarily focused on the Pullman campus of Washington State University.

Dr. Higheagle Strong is a graduate of Seattle Pacific University, where she majored in psychology. She earned a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in educational psychology from the University of Washington.

Deidre W. Evans, an associate professor in the department of computer science at Florida A&M University, was given the added duties as head of the Honors Program at the university. Dr. Evans joined the faculty at the university in 1994.

A graduate of Spelman College in Atlanta, Dr. Evans holds a bachelor’s degree, a master’s degree, and a Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Dawn C. Carr, a professor of sociology at Florida State University was named director of the Claude Pepper Center at the university. Dr. Carr’s research identifies ways to address barriers and increase opportunities for older adults to remain healthy and actively engaged in society.

Dr. Carr is a graduate of Arizona State University, where she majored in trumpet performance. She holds a Ph.D. in social gerontology from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.

Marisa Anne Pagnattaro, the Meigs Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Terry College of Business at the University of Georgia, has been given the added duties of vice president for instruction at the university. Earlier, Dr. Pagnattaro was vice provost for academic affairs at the university. She is the author of In Defiance of the Law: From Anne Hutchinson to Toni Morrison (Peter Lang International Academic Publishers, 2001).

Professor Pagnattaro earned her bachelor’s degree in English from Colgate University in Hamilton, New York. She holds a juris doctorate from New York Law School and a Ph.D. in English from the University of Georgia.

Wendy Arons, professor of dramatic literature in the Carnegie Mellon University School of Drama, has been appointed the new director of the Center for the Arts in Society at the university. She joined the faculty at the university in 2007. Professor Arons is the author of Performance and Femininity in Eighteenth-Century German Woman’s Writing: The Impossible Act (Palgrave Macmillan 2006).

Dr. Arons is a graduate of Yale University. She holds a master of fine arts degree in dramaturgy, a master’s degree in German literature, and a Ph.D. in literature from the University of California, San Diego.

Ayane Kozasa was appointed assistant professor of viola at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, effective August 15. She has served on the viola faculty at Adelphi University on Long Island in New York.

Kozasa is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, the Kronberg Academy in Germany, and the Cleveland Institute of Music